Laboratory:
UMR BOREA, Université de Caen Normandie (UCN), Caen
Context:
Anthropized coastal ecosystems are highly productive but this productivity is poorly estimated and the relationship between biodiversity and productivity remains to be explored. Indeed, the phytoplankton compartment is often reduced to the chlorophyll content of the water column. However, the estimation of chlorophyll biomass gives only a snapshot and does not reveal the complexity of this compartment. Chlorophyll concentration is the result of the net production, dilution by the currents, mortality and the photoacclimation. The estimation of primary production should enable us to understand the dynamics of the production of the system and to calculate the energy and carbon flux which fuel higher trophic levels. Primary production data available on European coasts are rare and occasional. However, in the last few years, we has been developing innovative approaches to study primary productivity at high spatial and temporal frequency. These approaches, based on the coupling of modulated fluorimetry (measurements of electron transport rate - ETR) and 13C, allow us to have robust methodologies in order to conduct in situ and laboratory studies in synergy. The PhD project will have two complementary objectives: the first will be to continue the photobiology study on the relationships between the ETR and C fixation in different phyla of microalgae as a function of abiotic forcings. The second objective will be to study in situ and in mesocosms the relationship between biodiversity and phytoplankton productivity at high-frequency by using different indicators of biodiversity (pigments, cytometry, molecular biology, morphology). This work will be placed in a diachronic study of phytoplankton dynamics in the Bay of Seine in relation to environmental pressures. This work will be performed in collaboration with LERN-IFREMER.
Thesis advisor:
Pascal Claquin, Professeur
Courriel : pascal.claquin@unicaen.fr
Tél. : 0231565112 / 0231362233
Send a curriculum vitae and a lettre of motivation by May 15th
The selected student will then have to present his application in front of the doctoral school EdNBISE
